Witnessing the Dawnbringers in action always presented a humbling spectacle. This was something Raimond was certain wouldn’t change, regardless of how long his tenure as a deacon of the Quorum continued.

Before him, holy knights, serving as the radiant sword of Ittar, moved in seamless harmony, collaborating to repel the monsters threatening their home. Their auras and invocations bathed the artificial space that connected realms in the golden brilliance of a pristine dawn, pushing back the ominous reds from the fires and lava erupting from various breaches in the ground.

Raimond’s focus shifted to a wounded Dawnbringer, retreating after a grievous blow from a demon three times their size, their left arm and shield hanging limp. Another Dawnbringer swiftly covered their ally, and Raimond redirected the invocation he was maintaining.

Radiant Resurgence.

Light surged from beneath Raimond, reaching across the distance between them and enveloping the injured Dawnbringer. Within moments, their arm regained function, and the knight wasted no time in leaping back into the fray.

As for Raimond, he wished his mask didn’t obstruct him from wiping away the sweat that covered his brow. The mask was a powerful relic, to be sure, and it certainly looked regal enough, but he had never been one for concealing his face. In this case, however, borrowing the power from Deacon Emberwood’s mask was preferable to the alternative, considering he was the sole healer present.

Typically, the Dawnbringers had dedicated members for this task, but while the order had hastily assembled as many Dawnbringers as possible for this, almost half had been preoccupied with other crises or events across the empire that involved the Hallowed Cabal and Tribe of Sin. Only nine Dawnbringers stood before him, six having recently arrived along with Fynn. If not for Raimond, they would’ve had to rely solely on the healing properties of their masterwork armors and artifacts.

This thankless task he’d assumed reminded him of the days when he had been a prospective member of the Dawnbringers himself, and Cadence had been the one overseeing him. She had worked him to the bone for his invocations and his—if he were to be frank—rather impressive mana reserves.

The memory sent a small shiver down his back.

He much preferred his current station. Even his time in the Ecclesiastical Congregation of Sacraments had been preferable to those arduous months.

As Raimond cast another invocation to aid his comrades, his attention paused briefly on a white-haired figure leaping into the air, snarling and swiping a pair of ethereal green claws at a behemoth of a demon. Fynn’s claws tore into the demon’s shoulder, while a Dawnbringer swung a glowing greatsword at its knees, forcing it down.

Fynn seemed to integrate well with the Dawnbringers. The youth exhibited an almost impeccable sense of combat and cooperation, making Raimond wonder if it was self-taught or learned during his time with Baroness Hartford. Perhaps a blend of both.

A roar echoed as another demon emerged from the dark rift at the center of the space, even more formidable looking than the rest. At this rate, it was only a matter of time before they had an archdemon on their hands, a challenge even for the Dawnbringers to handle while also dealing with other demons.

Frowning underneath his mask, Raimond turned his gaze to the remnants of the Sanctumbrum. The wooden platform it once stood on had long since turned to cinders, and the artifact was now a molten lump of crimson-black stone, its power having waned considerably.

He glanced to the side, where the once-black dome encompassing the area had turned a pale grey, marred with numerous cracks. It seemed as if the Baroness had been correct; this space would not last for much longer. Mayhap fighting these demons after her departure had even been entirely unnecessary.

Still, a rift to one of the six Blazes was not a threat left unattended, no matter the circumstances. The Sanctumbrum’s ability to open such a gate to begin with was alarming, though Raimond hoped it was a unique occurrence. Otherwise, the Tribe surely would have exploited such a feature before.

What surprised Raimond the most was his acceptance of the current situation, however. Particularly his decision to aid the Baroness and Miss Hale in their escape.

Certainly, the act itself had not been difficult, with Cadence and the other Dawnbringers too engrossed in battling the demons to see through the illusions he had used to disguise the Baroness’ disappearance. But while Raimond often acted somewhat lax in his Quorum duties, never before had he committed an act that could so plainly be considered treason.

It would take an extraordinary situation indeed to prompt him to act in such a manner.

Silently, he offered a prayer to Ittar, hoping his lord would show understanding, all while casting another healing invocation.

Truly, the Baroness had placed him in a rather difficult predicament. When Fynn had sought Raimond out to convey the woman’s words, she presented him with a choice. Unfortunately for him, neither the request nor the information Fynn had offered in return from the Baroness was something Raimond could disregard.

Perhaps that might have been another calculated maneuver by the Baroness. It had become clear to Raimond that, wary as he had originally been of the woman, he had grossly underestimated the extent of her machinations and cunning, not to mention the depth of the knowledge at her disposal. And none of that could compare to how far her involvement in current events went.

It was disconcerting. In truth, there were far too many indications pointing to the Baroness being a potential threat to both the Followers and the empire at large. For once, Raimond questioned whether his initial accommodating approach in investigating the woman had been the correct one, or if another deacon should have handled the issue.

If they had, perhaps the near manifestation of a Vile in their realm could have been averted.

Though such a scenario likely would also have spelled an unfortunate end for Miss Hale, given the truth of her identity as an incarnate. To Raimond’s knowledge, there were no methods of saving an incarnate from their fate as vessels for the Viles. Historically, such cases had all ended in death, with one exception that led to the event known as the Desolation Calamity, supposedly causing the collapse of an entire island chain the size of the Luicean Belt.

It would be the height of arrogance and folly to endanger the entire continent and its people for the safety of a single person destined to succumb to the demon inside them. Yet, that was precisely what Baroness Scarlett Hartford had done. And were Raimond to believe the woman herself, she had been justified in doing so. She had accomplished what he had not known possible and ‘saved’ Rosa.

He still harbored his doubts regarding that, as well as the Baroness’ assertion of having brought the Vile within Rosa to heel and contained the threat posed by the ancient demon.

There had even been a fleeting moment where Raimond had considered that the woman herself might be a demon in disguise, unlikely as that was. What he first witnessed upon arriving in this space did lend some credence to the Baroness’ words, however. Though he hadn’t seen the entire process, he had witnessed Malachi and Rosa perform some indescribable feat that had subdued the Vile’s presence within the bard.

It was impressive, but not what convinced him. No, that happened when the Baroness spoke the Vile’s name.

Raimond was no expert on demons, but he knew as much as any deacon of the Quorum was expected to know. He was familiar with the fundamentals of what defined their existence, and the significance names held to a demon. However, he would not claim to be able to distinguish between a false name and a true one.

Yet, when the Baroness had spoken that name, he knew. As if the name was woven into the very fabric of the world, in a way that felt almost irreverent in its inviolability, he had understood that was a true name.

Baroness Scarlett Hartford held the name of Anguish, one of the six Viles. She knew the name of a being that stood above even the most powerful of archdemons, who had reigned over one of the Blazes for millennia, and who had been the malefactor responsible for countless conflicts and miseries. A being infamous for its deceptiveness and malice, whose name transcended even the level of myths. Some even believed the Viles were nameless, as there were never any mentions of them, even in legends.

To most members of the Quorum, the notion of the Baroness somehow knowing such a name would seem preposterous. Of this, Raimond was certain. However, her possession of such hidden knowledge spoke to the depth of her understanding, and it showed why Raimond could not simply ignore her warning. In fact, it added more weight to all of her claims.

It was also partly why Raimond had believed her explanation for their group’s sudden departure from the Vile’s citadel and the presence of a rift linking to the Blazes at the heart of Crowcairn. He also did not doubt that Rosa might indeed have tried to save the villagers, even knowing their true identities. It aligned with the impression he had gotten of the bard. While his estimation of the Baroness herself had proven incorrect or lacking in several respects, he at least liked to think that he made a decent judgement of Rosa’s character, despite their relatively brief interactions.

Although that might be his own bias speaking. After all, foolish as it might seem to most imperial citizens, the needless bloodshed on the Tribe’s side in their endless fight against the empire had always left Raimond despondent. Ironically, such thoughts still lingered in his mind even after he had embraced Ittar’s teachings — a path that any member of the Tribe would deride. They did not seek his sympathy, nor did the empire wish for him to give it.

But he supposed there were unturned pages of one’s past that one truly never closed.

As one of the demons unleashed a torrent of dark flames from its wings towards the Dawnbringers, Raimond conjured a great barrier of light that snaked across the battlefield, blocking the flames and shielding his allies from the inferno. Two of the Dawnbringers soon seized the opportunity to sever the demon’s wings.

Drawing a deep breath, Raimond held his barrier a moment longer before dispersing it, again wishing he could remove the mask and the accumulating sweat beneath it. The fact that his mana was beginning to dwindle, after casting numerous invocations both in the citadel and during this battle, was a testament to the enormity of recent events. It was rare for someone renowned among the Followers for his vast mana reserves to reach such a point of exhaustion.

Now he was beginning to understand why some others were so envious of him.

A chuckle escaped him as his thoughts wandered back to the Baroness. From what he had seen, she relied on that necklace artifact of hers for her own mana reserves. During their time in the citadel, he had caught more than one disgruntled look from her, seemingly puzzled by his ostensibly inexhaustible supply of mana. At least there were some areas where the woman didn’t stupefy the imagination.

The recent events had been enlightening, both offering Raimond deeper insight into the Baroness, yet rendering her ever more ineffably enigmatic all the same.

He believed there was meaning behind the woman’s role and the knowledge she possessed.

Or rather, he was certain of it, for there were far too many things about her that stood out. He couldn’t precisely define what that meaning might be or why he was convinced of its presence, but his intuition, shaped by his numerous observations of the woman, suggested there was something about her that transcended far beyond the natural. Perhaps she was even a presence similar to that of the Augur’s.

That possibility left him concerned in more ways than he wanted to acknowledge, yet it also provided some solace. One of his major questions about the Baroness had finally found an answer. He had long pondered what motivated the woman’s actions and what that implied for her position towards the Followers. Contrary to most of the complexities surrounding her, the answer to that question proved to be, at least in part, rather straightforward.

The Baroness was driven by a desire to protect those close to her. The effort she had gone to in order to help Rosa, someone whose fate seemed locked in place, highlighted the lengths she would go to achieve this. That, at least, was a sentiment Raimond could understand and admire. In this world, few things were as beautiful as the bonds that tied individuals together, and the urge to protect one’s own was among the purest of desires, in his opinion.

However, he recognized that such a desire could potentially lead to ends most dire for the wider world at large, as might nearly have happened here. Like many aspects of life, even the noblest of intentions had a darker side.

While lamenting this, Raimond watched Fynn as the young man assisted another Dawnbringer in defeating a smaller, four-legged demon.

He had observed this in all members of the Baroness’ entourage, but none of them showed any hesitation in their loyalty to her. Raimond was uncertain whether Shin, Allyssa, and Fynn comprehended the full magnitude of the woman’s actions, but he believed they wouldn’t place their trust in her without good reason. Allyssa and Shin, he felt, were inherently kind souls, and Fynn, while possessing a certain naivety and innocence that might seem alluringly exploitable by some, was not as susceptible to manipulation as one might think.

Raimond’s thoughts were abruptly interrupted as the ground trembled violently. A colossal, clawed hand began to emerge from the rift, causing both the rift itself and the dome enclosing the space to shudder.

He narrowed his eyes, his focus sharpening.

The instability of the space and the threat this emerging demon posed did not escape the Dawnbringers’ attention. Three of them, led by Cadence’s domineering figure, began to cut a path through the demons at the front. Their armors, bathed in brilliant light, offered them temporary protection as they approached the rift at the center, fiercely striving to repel the demon attempting to break free from the weakening portal between realms.

Raimond sighed wearily as he cast more of his invocations, tapping into his rapidly diminishing store of mana—something Cadence no doubt expected him to do—to form protective barriers that prevented the other demons from encircling the trio entirely.

The rift itself remained unaffected by the Dawnbringers’ attacks, but their weapons, infused with power, managed to momentarily push back the bulbous, monstrous form of the demon pushing through it. One glance was enough for Raimond to recognize that it was an archdemon.

Meanwhile, the dome shook with increasing intensity, mirroring the rift’s gradual reduction in size.

The remaining Dawnbringers redoubled their efforts, unleashing their full auras in a concerted offensive against their adversaries — an effort Raimond contributed to, but wasn’t entirely convinced about its necessity. He suspected that the demons couldn’t escape this space without suffering severe repercussions. Since this place resembled the Blazes more than the Material Realm, travel between them should still be restricted for most demons.

As if to confirm his suspicions, a demon did attempt an escape, only to collide with the dome and be violently repelled. There, Fynn pounced on it with ferocious strength, delivering a crushing blow that shattered the earth beneath and collapsed part of its chest.

As the space continued to destabilize amid the battle, Cadence and her fellow Dawnbringers successfully delayed the archdemon’s entry until the rift had shrunk to the point where it was too small for any further passage. By the time it had nearly vanished, the dome surrounding them bore a deep grey color, webbed with countless cracks.

Though some of the strongest demons were still standing, the ground was strewn with the bodies of their dead or dying kin, while none of the Dawnbringers had fallen.

“Cadence,” Raimond called out. “If you’ll pardon me suggesting so, I think it best if we take our leave posthaste.”

At the site of the former rift, Cadence, the Second Light of the Dawnbringers, spun around after parrying a strike from a demon resembling a hybrid of a bat and a bipedal wolf. She glanced towards Raimond, seeming to give a single nod before signaling their retreat.

Without delay, the other Dawnbringers disengaged and started to withdraw, leaving behind several enraged demons. Raimond lingered for just a moment to ensure that young Fynn followed suit before making his own hurried way towards the dome separating them from the outside world. The demons’ frustrated shouts, some of them resembling coherent words, echoed behind him as he crossed the grey barrier, experiencing a brief, numbing sensation of discomfort throughout his body, before emerging onto the dark streets of Crowcairn.

He surveyed the deserted village, then snapped his fingers. A good quarter of the area around him was bathed in daylight.

There was still some mana left in him.

Turning his head, he took some steps forward while scanning for the others. The Dawnbringers had exited at different locations, and he spotted some both to his right and left, positioned with weapons drawn to fight any demons that might follow. Presumably, they already had the whole dome surrounded.

A tense silence ensued as the cracks in the grey dome widened, resembling streaks of white lightning, yet no demons appeared. Then, abruptly and almost imperceptibly, the dome shattered silently, collapsing into itself and vanishing into a singularity.

The space once occupied by it was now completely empty, devoid of demons, the Sanctumbrum, or the Blaze-tainted landscape that had been there. What remained was a smooth, expansive crater in front of Raimond.

The Dawnbringers, positioned around the perimeter of the crater, soon began to converge on Raimond’s illuminated position.

One of them, a fellow named Westcott if Raimond was correct—identifying them could sometimes be challenging with the armor and all—stepped up to Fynn as the youth approached.

“What was your name again, young man?” he asked, nodding approvingly. “Your efforts were commendable. You clearly have significant potential!”

Fynn simply stared at the man, as though considering if a response was required or not. Raimond decided he would step in to help.

“This spirited exemplar of stoicism is Fynn, a devoted retainer of a certain acquaintance of mine who proved instrumental in navigating our recent ordeal.” Raimond’s instinct was to offer one of his well-established smiles, but then he remembered his own mask. Instead, he placed a hand on Fynn’s shoulder. “Quite dependable, is he not?”

Westcott eyed Raimond briefly before nodding once more. “Indeed.”

Fynn, turning his attention to Raimond, met his gaze with a composed look.

“Something on your mind?” Raimond asked.

“Your clothes are different. And wasn’t that mask supposed to be given to the Congregation you’re part of?”

Raimond blinked. Well, at least he now had an answer to whether Fynn knew of his true identity as a deacon.

Removing his mask, he offered the previously-withheld smile. “The circumstances necessitated for me to adopt a temporary change in role, but fret not, for I remain the same dashing and affable priest you’ve undoubtedly grown accustomed to.”

“I wasn’t worried,” Fynn said.

“No, no, there is no need for the false bravado in my presence. I assure you, I have a will and resolve forged of steel, so you can speak freely.”

Before Fynn could respond, a woman’s voice interjected. “This isn’t the time for your jokes, Deacon Abram.”

Raimond turned to see Cadence approaching, flanked by three other Dawnbringers. With their arrival, all nine of the present Dawnbringers were now gathered, each still donning their masks.

Raimond’s demeanor shifted to one of determined solemnity. She wasn’t wrong, of course. The gravity of the situation was unprecedented, and his subsequent actions would decide a great deal of things.

As Cadence halted in front of him, her eyes briefly met Fynn’s before surveying the distant citadel on the horizon. “Your directives led us away from our original target, Abram. While I won’t question the necessity, I hope this diversion hasn’t further complicated our mission. Botho, Diandre.” She raised a fist, motioning towards the village edge. “Secure the mounts and inform the duke’s people. Ask them to postpone any investigations for now. The citadel seems quieter than earlier, but we’ll approach it without delay.”

Two of the Dawnbringers promptly left to execute her orders. Cadence turned back to Raimond with her voice adopting an even sterner tone. “On our arrival, I sensed an especially menacing presence from those individuals you were conversing with. I relied on your words that you were dealing with it while we engaged the demons, but it appears as they’ve all managed to escape. Were they responsible for what transpired here?”

Raimond locked eyes with her golden mask, resisting the urge to flash a disarming smile.

Fynn stood nearby, quietly observing the exchange.

“I’m afraid explaining the situation in its entirety will take time,” Raimond said, “but I do believe the immediate threat has subsided.”

“I’m still seeing a Vile’s citadel,” Cadence pointed out.

“Yes, well, that part is…rather perplexing, I will admit.”

Raimond could tell that there was something different with the citadel from before, but he would need to confirm that for himself.

Cadence remained silent, studying him. Finally, she let out a slight sigh and turned to leave, joined by the other Dawnbringers. “I’ll be requesting Deacon Solnate to allow my presence when you provide that explanation, Abram. Knowing you, I do expect it to be thorough.”

Raimond did flash his smile to the woman’s back, though his internal sentiment was less buoyant.

Perhaps his understanding of the Baroness warranted reassessment after all. For while he had none but himself to blame in the end for his actions, surely it would take a demon most conniving and cunning to lure him into a predicament such as this.

Once Cadence and the others had departed, only Raimond and Fynn remained.

“You’re weird,” the young man said.

“…Yes, thank you for that astute observation.”